


Lost without you

by ferggirl



Category: Once Upon a Time in Wonderland (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-14
Updated: 2014-01-14
Packaged: 2018-01-08 16:15:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1134795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ferggirl/pseuds/ferggirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"When you truly love someone you don’t -"</p>
<p>"Bollocks. Of course you need proof. True love only works like that in fairytales and kids’ books. And in case you haven’t noticed," Will waved an arm at the dense forest, "Wonderland is neither of those."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lost without you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [OpenPandorasBox](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OpenPandorasBox/gifts).



Alice has never been good at waiting.

When her father had asked her to sit quietly in the garden and wait while he spoke to the reverend ( _again_ … they spoke every week since her mother’s death, one would think they would run out of things to say) she had instead followed a very peculiar rabbit until it led her down a very peculiar hole.

When, three years and two visits later, her teacher had asked her to wait while Master Joseph of the big house attempted to recite his sums, she had grown bored and drawn a jabberwocky eating stupid Master Joseph, resulting in a month of cleaning the blackboard.

When her stepmother had asked her to wait until after tea to pass judgment on her young spotted suitor, she had thrown a fit big enough that they’d sent her to a madhouse to be rid of her. 

No, she’d never developed a talent for waiting.

(At least, she reasoned, she’d also long since stopped expecting anyone to wait on her. Not her Father, he’d found a new family. Not Wonderland, which kept changing whether she was there or not. Cyrus… well, but that would be different, surely.)

Yet here she was, so close to what she had wanted so badly for so long, and she had to wait.

"I can practically feel your frustration," Will said. He was leaning heavily against a tree, a stout walking stick broken at his feet. His left foot was heavily bandaged, and he held it a few inches off the ground. "Just go on without me, Alice. Your genie awaits."

And that was the thing, wasn’t it? Alice was sure he’d be there, so sure. Except when she wasn’t.

"I’m not leaving you to the Caterpillar or the Queen," she said stubbornly. "You wouldn’t even be hurt if it wasn’t for saving me from that stupid grove."

She hadn’t waited for Will. No, she’d used all of her magic dust to get directions. And she would have failed completely if he’d given up on her in return.

But Will never gave up on her.

Never.

So she’d be damned if she was going to fail him again.

She took a few steps back toward him, and reached out. “I’ll walk slow, take my hand.”

"You’re being bloody stubborn," he muttered, moving to obey. "You can cover that distance in one night on your own."

"It doesn’t matter," she said, closing his larger hand in her small strong one. His palms were rough with calluses and his thumb tangled in her fingers before it settled against the smooth skin on the back of her hand. "I’d be lost without you to help me on my way, wouldn’t I?"

They were so close, linked at the hands, that when she glanced back over her shoulder with a teasing smile, his longing look felt almost like a kiss.

It stole her breath, at least.

He broke the moment, his jaunty grin sliding into place quickly enough that if she wasn’t still gasping for air, she’d have thought she imagined the pain in his eyes. 

"Well you won’t need me around much longer, will you? You’ll have your Cyrus to keep you out of trouble."

"As long as he’s there," she murmured distractedly, helping him down a rough patch as she fought to regain her equilibrium.

They paused for a moment at the bottom. She was breathing hard, and he was pale and clammy.

"You look awful," she said, worry creasing her forehead. "You said it was just a sprain."

"And you told me you’d leave behind anyone who slowed you down."

“ _Knave_.”

"Oi, come off it, Alice," he groaned. "You only call me that when I’m in trouble."

"Do I?" She watched him slide to the ground with growing concern. "Just how much worse than a sprain is it?"

"It’s nothing," he said irritably. "A flesh wound from one of those creepy vine monsters."

"You said the grove didn’t affect you."

"Well it affected my bloody foot, didn’t it?"

She unwrapped his hasty bandage with a sympathetic hiss. 

"Oh, Will."

"You keep that blade well away from me."

"You can’t walk on this today."

"Well go and get Cyrus, then, so I can use my bloody wish."

She bit her lip. “It doesn’t… You know it doesn’t work like that. He has to be safe. I promised he’d be safe.”

His eyes were closed, and as she watched he fought to summon the energy to stand. “And what did he promise you?”

"What are you talking about?"

"You’re going to free him. What is he going to fix for you that no one else can? What will he do?"

"He.. he will never leave me alone." 

"Alice," he sounded tired. "He already did." 

It hurt to hear it. Alice had to force herself not to recoil from the force of his doubt. She’d spent years reminding herself that others were to blame. The Red Queen, and now Jafar, conspiring to keep them apart.

"It wasn’t his fault, he tried…"

"Why were you even at the boiling sea? Why wasn’t he more careful?"

"He’d been in that bottle for so long! He wanted to see the world, and he took me with him. He  _loves_  me.”

"Where’s the proof of that?" Will sounded like he’d had this conversation before. She had thought he, at least, believed in her. In what she was doing.

"When you truly love someone you don’t -"

"Bollocks. Of course you need proof. True love only works like that in fairytales and kids’ books. And in case you haven’t noticed," he waved an arm at the dense forest, "Wonderland is neither of those."

"It used to be," she said plaintively. 

When she’d first come, it had been magical. Full of amazing sights and dangerous people and such a lark. All of the fun, and back before tea time. 

Of course, it was tea time a year later. 

And then, when she was at her lowest, she’d met Cyrus. And he’d told her she didn’t need proof, that she didn’t need to make her father believe her. That she could be happy with just him, forever.

It had to be true.

She had nothing else left.

"You do know you’re brilliant?" Will’s eyes were open again, fixed on her melancholy expression.

"I’m not, you have to understand, Cyrus was always the one…"

"Alice, just listen to me. You found Wonderland all by yourself when you were just a girl. Then you came back, you  _found a way back_ , because you knew you weren’t mad, knew that your father could be made to understand.”

"He’s not an unreasonable sort, Father, he’s just not very imaginative," she whispered.

"The whole time you fought off queens and dealt with Cheshire and the Caterpillar… you were just a little girl! And then you got older, you got yourself locked in a madhouse, and when I came looking for you, bam. Up you got. Like you hadn’t been told for years that you were bonkers, that you were nothing. You’ve saved my life multiple times, you figured out the Rabbit’s problem, you try to help  _everyone…”_

He paused for breath and she sank down to sit beside him.

"It’s nothing much," she said. "Anyone could have-"

"For a brilliant girl, you’re a real idiot, you know that?" He squinted at her. "No one else could. Shut up and take the bloody compliment already."

She looked away, the intensity in his eyes a bit overwhelming. “Why are you here?”

"What?"

"I know I told you that you owe me, because of your heart, but when have you ever gone where you didn’t want to go? So why did you come? Why are you still here?"

"Well, at this point, I’m counting on you fighting off any hungry beasties with that blade of yours."

"Will."

It was his turn to look away. “I tried to make someone happy, once. I did a pretty miserable job of it. In the end, I think I just made her much more unhappy.”

"You cannot blame yourself for Anastasia’s choices," she said sternly.

"No, not for her choices. But for mine. I liked being a thief. I liked who I was, a member of Robin Hood’s band. And I just thought that I could get a new life, with no hard work, no sacrifice of my own desires." He paused and glanced back at her. "That’s no way to make someone happy."

"Neither is running off to marry a king when she’s upset!"

"Not her best moment, no," he said ruefully, "but it was certainly one way to get what she wanted."

"So you came back because of Anastasia?" It hurt more than she expected it to. Why was that? She knew her purpose, her end goal, and Will Scarlet’s feelings had nothing to do with it. Did they?

"God no," he said with a bitter laugh. "I came back despite her."

"I don’t understand."

"Alice." He sighed her name with such exasperation that she expected a scold telling her firmly to leave it alone. 

Another thing she’d never been good at.

"Fine." Tears stung at her eyes, and she stood, intending to look for some firewood so they might stop for the night. His hand grabbed her wrist and held her in place.

"Ahh, don’t cry. It’s nothing. I-I came back because if anyone deserves to be happy, it’s you." 

And then the tears did come.

Because she had been so sure, when she was running wild with Cyrus, that she knew what Happy was supposed to be: one man who would be her everything, her whole world, so she didn’t have to concern herself with the rest of it.

She’d had years to consider the error of her ways. Weeks to hope anew. She was mere days from finding Cyrus, and she was terrified. Because she didn’t think she could be that carefree girl again. The girl that Cyrus had wanted in his mad life.

Alice didn’t realize she had sunk to the ground and was crying on his leather-clad shoulder until he dropped a kiss onto her head.

“I have to get firewood,” she sniffled, trying to sit up. “For, for camp.”

“Relax,” he scoffed, his voice rough. “It’s downright balmy out. We’ll survive the night.”

So she stayed. And as she drifted off to sleep with his arm around her, she wondered what might have happened if she were just a bit braver, or if he’d kept the heart she’d rescued for him all those years ago.


End file.
